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In the weeks since Beijing passed the Hong Kong national security law, political titles have been pulled from public library shelves, a protest slogan has been banned and students have been prohibited from political activities in schools. With lawyers, academics, and journalists expressing concern over the laws vague wording, the future of free speech and expression in the city is uncertain.

Booksellers, like the citys librarians and publishers, fear stricter regulations on the titles they are allowed to offer, creating a chilling effect among institutions which traditionally uphold and safeguard the free flow of ideas, information, and narratives.

Fears for the independent bookselling arena in Hong Kong first arose in 2015, when five staff members of Causeway Bay Books which sold political gossip titles disappeared. Then, in mid-2018, it was revealed that the China Liaison Office in Hong Kong owned the company controlling Sino United Publishing (SUP), which in turn controlled more than half the citys bookstores.

But there are still booksellers in Hong Kong who continue to safeguard against Chinese influence. Albert Wan of Bleak House Books, a local English-language bookstore at the heart of a tight-knit reading community, is committed to resisting any changes in how he runs his business. This includes continuing to stock sensitive political titles that could potentially contravene the law: [These titles] mostly would be books that are not published by large presses. Books that relate specifically to Hong Kong and the law, the Umbrella Movement, or protests from last summer these are obviously the most sensitive books, he told HKFP.

He now wonders whether previously unproblematic titles will become contraband: Under the new law, and based on what we know happens in mainland China, would it be a problem to stock 1984, Animal Farm, or On Tyranny? [What about] general theory-based books [or] academic texts about revolutionary movements that have taken place in China in the past? Who knows?

As a former US lawyer before running his own bookshop, Wan is sceptical about the legal validity of recent government-issued statements about what may or may not be acceptable: Its hard to tell where the red-lines are. Everyones saying it, but its true. It doesnt help when the government willy-nilly comes out and makes statements about the law or how people might be violating it. Theres no official interpretation. What the government says, at least in my understanding of how things work their statements are not the law, he said.

Wan is not the only independent bookstore owner frustrated by the legislation. May Fung of ACO Book a local bookstore specialising in arts and culture also expressed concern: Every publication on any subject is now subject to this national security law. I think it is dangerous and I am somewhat worried, she told HKFP.

If we still lived in a society with rule of law and a legal system we can trust, we can go to court and the court will fairly decide whether or not a certain title contravenes the law. But this new national security agency is outside of the government, so thats not necessarily the case now; we dont know whether or not they will be fair.

However, Fung, like Wan, is committed to business as usual, unless forced to do otherwise. I wont stop operations because [the government] may or may not ban certain titles. We will keep doing what we are doing until we are forced into a corner, she said.

Since the anti-extradition law protests started last June, Wan and his store have taken a clear stance in support of the pro-democracy movement. He says that, especially for indie bookstores like Bleak House, it is difficult to stay apolitical.

I dont think theres anything wrong with being apolitical, its really up to the person who runs the bookshop. I think its a problem to not have a stance personally, but it doesnt necessarily have to translate into what you do for work, he said. [But] its a little hard to do that when youre selling books the books you stock reflect the perspectives and the ideologies of the person or people running the bookshop its harder for smaller bookshops to be in the middle and not take a side.

When asked whether he will obey orders to pull books off his shelves for the sake of national security, Wan gave a tentative answer: We would not go and start pulling books off our shelves just because we receive [an order to do so]. It depends on the nature of the order and what itll look like.

We are very hesitant to go down the path of any kind of censorship, whether its self-imposed or whether its imposed from outside because if we go down that road theres really no turning back.

Fung echoed the sentiment: I dont want to go to prison but I will not self-censor until I absolutely have no other choice, she said.

Despite their commitment to resisting self-censorship, both Wan and Fung said they have to weigh the risks to their livelihoods and the safety of those around them.

My initial reaction will be to tell them to f-off, but I also have a bookstore to run I have responsibilities as a husband and father, Wan said. Its a matter of how muchI feel like I can keep doing [what Im doing] and not be a burden and compromise the safety of my family.

If they do come and tell us certain books can no longer be sold like we saw with Causeway Books, then I will have to stop selling the titles to protect my colleagues from being arrested, Fung said.

Elsewhere in the city, international bookstores are adopting a more cautious approach under the new law. The manager of a bookstore selling books by a German publisher, who requested to remain anonymous, told HKFP their brand has had to self-censor for the sake of business.

Following the passing of the national security law, we do feel that the freedom that once existed has been curtailed. he said. For example, we used to be very carefree and bold in our displays in art fairs in the city, we even put on display a book about Tibet in recent years.

This year, however, the new law has forced them to rein in their displays. We sell lots of books on very diverse subjects. But there is definitely more self-censorship now. At the end of the day, we are a business entity, he said.

This doesnt necessarily mean the international brand will steer clear of every potentially problematic title in Hong Kong: In our shop, we are still selling books by Ai Wei Wei. Its just for higher-profile events, we now have to be less bold.

Under the security law, the company is approaching bookselling in Hong Kong with lessons learnt from its operations on the mainland. While we have healthy business relations on the mainland, we have been careful about the types of books we sell in the mainland Chinese market. For example, we stay away from selling more sensitive books such as those depicting maps or dealing with religion. the manager said.

Beyond preemptive self-censorship, international bookshops in the city may encounter direct censorship as the laws implementation unfolds. If told to remove certain titles from their catalogue, the brand would have to comply: We are a business in Hong Kong and have no choice but to follow the law.

This, however, is a marked change from the companys original intentions when setting up operations in the city more than ten years ago: Its not necessarily what we want since we set up our regional office in Hong Kong as it was a free city and one of Asias capitals with the freedom of publication, the manager added.

We can still run a healthy business even with the tighter controls and with more titles becoming more sensitive. However, we will have to see how the new law unfolds to see if we will further expand in the city.

HKFP also approached other large book chains in the city, including Swindon Books, Bookazine, and HKMoAs TheBookshop, but did not receive any response.

In spite of the rapidly changing political landscape, booklovers are still carrying on as before. Commenting on whether he has seen a change in his bookstores community, Wan was surprised at the lack of immediate change: We thought that people were going to change their book-buying habits after they passed the law because we have books and literature at the bookshop that some people might deem problematic, he said. But people are still buying the same books they were buying before the law was passed.

The manager for the German-based retailer suggested that customers themselves still had the agency to resist censorship and the curtailing of freedoms through their spending: Our customers are using their purchasing power in the same way, they are buying the same titles they did before.

Likewise, despite the pressures, Wan said he believes bookstores too must continue to play their quiet yet crucial rolein facilitating access to knowledge: [Our] duty is just to keep the flow of information going. To keep it as open and as wide and as free as possible. Theres nothing special they have to do. Its not like they have to fight back or say anything thats especially incendiary or provocative, he said.

He said he has this hope for other bookstores: Just [keep] doing business the way they used to before the law was passed. Just maintaining that sense of freedom that is a trademark of Hong Kong society. This is what sets it apart from the mainland. To maintain that atmosphere and that culture is important.

For Fung, keeping her store open and uncensored is a question of keeping knowledge accessible for all.

I think bookstores play an important role in providing access to knowledge in the community. Not everybody has access to an official education so its vital to keep providing a channel of knowledge to society, she said. This is important for me, and I think lots of people also believe in this.

And the future for Hong Kong bookstores? The fate of bookstores is sort of tied to [Hong Kong] as a society thats rooted in law and free expression and transparency. You cannot run a bookstore without those core principles in place, Wan said.

The way Hong Kong goes, bookshops will go. Right now it doesnt look good, but who knows? We just have to stay hopeful and keep doing what were doing.

Originally posted here:
I will continue until I have no other choice: The art of bookselling under Hong Kongs national security law - Hong Kong Free Press

The Department of Justice (DOJ) recently outlined proposed reforms to Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act of 1996.[1] Section 230 has been in place since the early days of the Internet and protects online platforms from liability for certain third-party posts. It has recently become a point of contention between Big Tech and the Trump Administration. Recently, a presidential tweet was labeled with a fact-checking message that described the content as unsubstantiated.[2] The President claimed the label was intended to chill his rights under the First Amendment and subsequently signed the Executive Order on Preventing Online Censorship, calling for review and clarification of the scope of Section 230. The Executive Order also calls on the Secretary of Commerce and the Attorney General to engage in rule-making with the Federal Communications Commission to clarify when a tech company could be deemed to be taking part in not taken in good faith.[3] Additionally, the Order encouraged the Federal Trade Commission to investigate unfair or deceptive acts or practices committed by online platforms.

How did this relatively small piece of legislation become the center of a heated debate?

By way of background, Section 230 shields websites from legal liability for posts, including comments, images, and videos, of third-party users. At the time this legislation was passed, the Internet was vastly different from what it is today. In the 90s, as the tech world was beginning to grow, Congress sought to encourage that growth through statutory protections. Section 230 provides websites with immunity for posts left by users, and allows for Good Samaritan protection from civil lawsuits if websites remove or moderate posts that they consider to be obscene, lewd, lascivious, filthy, excessively violent, harassing, or otherwise objectionable.[4] This way, websites can still clean up posted content without having to worry about being targeted via lawsuits for choosing to police and self-regulate their own domains, so long as they do so in good faith.

Section 230 allows platforms to be available to all users to share, gather, and disseminate information. Websites, especially those with enormous platforms, host millions upon millions of individual posts every single day. Even with dedicated moderators and advanced algorithms in place, it is a huge undertaking to examine every single post to determine whether it is illegal or inappropriate; and even with a robust procedure in place, it is hardly fail-safe. But there is growing concern about who gets the final say about what is considered inappropriate and when it should be revised, removed, or labeled. Section 230 has become a flashpoint and raises complex First Amendment, online safety, and competition considerations.

The Executive Order alone might not seem like it has teeth, unless Congress agrees with the President and passes legislation that repeals or amends Section 230. But the rule-making prompted by the Executive Order could shift interpretation of the law, calling into doubt the wide protections enjoyed by tech companies. Moreover, Attorney General William Barr has been vocal about his concerns regarding Section 230 and its protections, prompting the DOJ to seriously examine the law to propose a way forward.

In February, the DOJ hosted a one-day workshop called Section 230 Nurturing Innovation or Fostering Unaccountability? inviting both public and private stakeholders to confer about the laws transformation since its enactment to the present day and whether it needs to be modified to account for this new era of Big Tech. The DOJ states that it also met with companies that attended or indicated interest in talking about Section 230, although it is unclear which companies that included.

Last month, following its 10-month review of the law, the DOJ released its recommendations for Section 230 reform.[5] Rather than seek a complete repeal of the legislation, the DOJ identified four key categories where reform should take place in order to realign the scope of Section 230 with the realities of the modern internet.[6] These four areas are (1) Incentivizing Online Platforms to Address Illicit Content, (2) Clarifying Federal Government Enforcement Capabilities to Address Unlawful Content, (3) Promoting Competition, and (4) Promoting Open Discourse and Greater Transparency.[7]

The first category seeks to strip away protection from those who purposely facilitate or solicit unlawful content and allows for civil lawsuits involving child abuse, terrorism, and cyber-stalking to proceed, thus incentivizing websites to be proactive about tracking and removing illegal content. The second category proposes more government intervention through civil enforcement actions. The third category seeks to clarify that companies cannot use Section 230 to protect themselves from antitrust actions where liability is based on harm to competition, not on third-party speech.[8] Finally, the fourth category is aimed at refining the language of Section 230, including an addition of good faith.

Some argue that Section 230 should be updated to address some of the potential dangers of the growing Internet that were not present in 1996. If this effort gains more traction, many view it as imperative that tech representatives be involved in the conversation because they are the experts in devising the algorithms and training the moderators to track down illegal and harmful content. A companys role and responsibility to police, remove, and/or label content may implicate complex First Amendment concerns. There may not be a one-size-fits-all approach to updating Section 230 to address all posted content in all types of forums. Many will be watching to see whether there will be changes to this law that has helped fuel online growth.

[1] https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-issues-recommendations-section-230-reform.%5B2%5D Twitter Safety (Twitter Safety). We added a label to two @realDonaldTrump Tweets about Californias vote-by-mail plans as part of our efforts to enforce our civic integrity policy. We believe those Tweets could confuse voters about what they need to do to receive a ballot and participate in the election process. May 27, 2020, 10:54 p.m. tweet.[3] Exec. Order on Preventing Online Censorship (May 28, 2020), available at https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/executive-order-preventing-online-censorship/.%5B4%5D 47 U.S.C. 230(c)(2)(A).[5] https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-issues-recommendations-section-230-reform.%5B6%5D https://www.justice.gov/ag/department-justice-s-review-section-230-communications-decency-act-1996.%5B7%5D https://www.justice.gov/file/1286331/download.%5B8%5D Id. at p. 4.

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DOJ Takes a Stance on Section 230 Reform that Could Place Additional Burdens on Online Platforms - JD Supra

Parler CEO John Matze on offering a Twitter app alternative which allows users to express free speech and engage in discussions without censorship.

Some users have become frustrated with the most mainstream social media sites, like Facebook and Twitter, over alleged conservative censorship, data security issues and other concerns.

They're creating accounts on sites like Gab, 4chan and the newly minted Parler however, it's unclear whether these companies will ever take significant market share away from today'ssocial media giants.

WHO IS PARLER CEO JOHN MATZE?

Some sites, like 4chan,have reputations as gathering places for extremists since the site isloath to censor offensive posts.

Meanwhile, sites like Parler are marketing to conservatives who think that companies like Twitter and Facebook are censoring right-of-center viewpoints.

Parler's homepage. (Screenshot)

"I think they are censoring," Parler CEO John Matze Jr. told FOX Business' "Mornings with Maria." "I don't think they believe they are. I don't know that they would admitthey are, but it is pretty clear that they're behaving like publications. ... They're telling you they're an open community forum for people behaving like publications, choosing what gets to reach its audience, what doesn't."

WHO IS TWITTER CEO JACK DORSEY?

Here are some alternative social media sites trying to grow their platforms or rehab their images:

Imageboard 4chan, a weird and often lewd corner of the internet,was founded by 15-year-old Christopher Poole in 2003. The site allows users to post anonymously on topic boards that range from politics to anime.

WHICH SOCIAL MEDIA SITE HAS THE MOST USERS?

Poole left 4chan and is now a product manager at Google. 4chan has grown to more than22 million monthly visitors worldwide.

Christopher Poole, founder of 4chan, speaks during the TechCrunch Disrupt conference in New York, on Tuesday, May 25, 2010. (Ramin Talaie/Corbis via Getty Images)

4chan has also faced serious criticism for its lack of controls after killers posted gory photos of their victims, including in the case of slain teen Bianca Devins.

Andrew Torba foundedGab.comin 2016,nearly 15 years after 4chan was created, and Gabhas a much smaller user base than 4chan's. Gab's interface is similar to Twitter's, but it is banned by both the Apple App Store and Google Play Store because of its content.

WHAT IS SECTION 230?

Gab insisted it has "zero tolerance" for racism and terrorism after facing backlash when it was revealed that the Pittsburgh synagogue shooter had posted anti-Semitic messages on the website.

The site had more than 1.1 million registered users as of April.

In June, alternativesocial mediasite Parler seemedto have sprung up overnight after fed-upconservativesannouncedthey were making accounts because of Twitter's censorship policies.

But the sitehas been around since 2018 and was founded by John Matze Jr. and Jared Thomson. Both studied computer science at the University of Denver.

Conservative pundit Dan Bongino ispushing Parler afterannouncingearlier in June that he had taken an ownership stake in the platform.

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Ello now describes itself as a network for "creators" after starting out as an ad-free Facebook alternative in 2014. The site was not user-friendly and therefore unable to retain a solid user base, according to TechCrunch. Its reinvention focuses on connecting artists with partnership opportunities and allowing them to share their work with the wider world.

Ello's homepage. (Screenshot)

The site had about 625,000 artists as of 2017, according to TechCrunch.

A lot of people thought we died and went away and the whole time weve been cultivating a really niche and creative community thats gotten more focused as Ive been able to enact my vision," CEO Todd Berger told TechCrunch.

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What alternative social media sites are there? - Fox Business

Ellen Pao keeps trying to make Ellen Pao happen. But, to paraphrase her own words the world doesnt seem to think shes important.

This former Reddit CEO was forced to quit after a backlash caused by her (early) attempts to muzzle and censor free and unruly-by-nature Reddit communities. And although her legacy in this sense has since been gaining more and more momentum on that fairly unique social platform few credit or still remember Pao as the pioneer of the current woeful policies.

Pao, who has since co-founded a diversity consulting non-profit called Project Include, (which is exactly what it sounds like it is) also in the meanwhile lost a gender discrimination lawsuit against former employers Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers.

But there are still friendly outlets like The Guardian who will give her space and time, and now, its time for Pao to offer her two cents on free speech moderation on giant social media in the context of their treatment of ills such as racism, and presidents such as Donald Trump.

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Under the headline, They dont think its important: Ellen Pao on why Facebook cant beat hate Pao whose approach to Reddit back in the day is described cynically as a more holistic view of protecting free expression shares lessons she thinks she learned while attempting to detoxify Reddit (Guardians choice of words).

The issue is Facebook allowing Trump to have a voice on the platform, even as others like Twitter, Reddit itself, and YouTube went about labeling his posts, banning subreddits, etc., all on hate speech grounds.

So why is Facebook holding out? According to Pao, Facebook has an unintelligible set of rules for moderators, and the higher-ups are simply not paying any attention.

Pao also advises less outsourced mercenary moderator staff and instead incorporates them into the full-time employee collective for better allegiance to the cause and of course, better control.

She even suggests that some Facebook moderators despite insider testimonies showing some of them stringently and openly anti-free expression might be making pro-Trump decisions because they are being bullied, unbeknownst to Facebook.

But why would Facebook disregard these points? The interviewer prods Pao on in a tiringly predictable direction.

Most of the CEOs of social media companies are white, and most of them are men. I believe that youre the only woman of color who has run a major platform. Do you think that that informed the way that you approached the job?

To nobodys surprise, Pao agreed. As for what Mark Zuckerberg, Jack Dorsey, and Susan Wojcicki need to do Just do the right thing. Most of them know what the right thing to do is. Just have that conviction and push your way through.

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Ellen Pao calls for more Facebook censorship, says its the right thing to do - Reclaim The Net

TikTok was never supposed to be political. When it launched in the US in 2018, the video app was marketed as a fun place to discover goofy content and experiment with its sophisticated editing software and vast music library. Yet nearly two years and 165 million nationwide downloads later, TikTok has been a platform for teachers strikes, QAnon conspiracy theories, Black Lives Matter protests, and a teen-led campaign to sabotage a Trump rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma. The TikTok algorithm is perfectly suited to spread political content faster and to a wider audience than any social media app in history, whether the company wants to admit it or not.

Now TikTok is proving itself to be political in a much broader way, one that challenges the very existence of the app. White House officials are talking seriously about attempting to ban it (how the government would choose to do so is less clear) in the wake of rising tensions with China, where TikToks parent company ByteDance is based.

There are two major factors at play when we talk about the risks TikToks ownership could potentially pose: data privacy and censorship. While the former is potentially easier to understand (the Equifax hack, where members of the Chinese military were charged with stealing the personal information of 145 million Americans, is perhaps the most famous example), the latter, which includes how TikTok instructs its moderators and changes its algorithm, could have more existential and more difficult-to-predict consequences for the US at large.

Will a ban actually happen? President Trumps chief of staff, Mark Meadows, said in July that a decision could come in weeks, not months. But the conversation is a lot more complicated than Is China stealing our data? although thats likely how the Trump White House would prefer to frame it. TikTok has become a straw man for fears over a serious competitor to Silicon Valley: If a generation of kids is synonymous with an app owned by China, what does that mean for Americas role in global technology?

Experts in cybersecurity and Chinese tech make it clear that the issue is not black and white, and that serious concerns about national security are likely rooted not in xenophobia but in the fact that the Communist Party of China (CCP) under President Xi Jinping has a track record of surveillance, censorship, and data theft. There are also those who warn that the US banning TikTok and other Chinese-owned apps could set a dangerous precedent for a less free and open internet ironically, the sort of internet modeled after that of China.

The governments interest in TikToks ties to China and its communist leadership stems from last fall, when Sens. Marco Rubio (R-FL), Chuck Schumer (D-NY), and Tom Cotton (R-AR) called for an investigation into the company. Their statements came after reports from the Guardian and the Washington Post revealed that TikTok had at one point instructed its moderators to censor videos considered sensitive by the Chinese government.

By November, the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), which investigates the potential national security implications of foreign acquisitions of US companies, announced that it would be reviewing ByteDances acquisition of Musical.ly, the app that would become TikTok. Meanwhile, TikTok has been steadfast in its claim that it does not send US user data to China and does not remove content sensitive to its government and would not if it were asked. Two Chinese intelligence laws from 2014 and 2017, however, require companies to assist with any government investigation and hand over all relevant data without refusal.

In a statement to Vox, a TikTok spokesperson wrote:

Protecting the privacy of our users data is of the utmost importance to TikTok. Theres a lot of misinformation about TikTok right now. The reality is that the TikTok app isnt even available in China. TikTok is led by an American CEO, with hundreds of employees and key leaders across safety, security, product, and public policy in the U.S. TikTok stores U.S. user data in Virginia, with backup in Singapore, and we work to minimize access across regions. We welcome conversations with lawmakers who want to understand our company. Were building a team here in Washington, D.C. so lawmakers and experts can come to us with questions or concerns. We know that actions speak louder than words, which is why were opening Transparency Centers in LA and DC so that lawmakers and invited experts can see for themselves how we moderate content and keep our users data secure.

In early July, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told Fox News that the US was considering a TikTok ban after months of rising tensions with China and a ban of more than 50 Chinese apps including TikTok in India the week prior. Since then, TikTok users have been panicking over the potential loss of the internets greatest time waster; the Senate just advanced a bill to ban TikTok from all government devices. Facebook, too, is closing in: The company announced it will launch its copycat product, Instagram Reels, in the US in August.

Banning TikTok isnt as straightforward as it may sound in a country built upon the First Amendment, but there are several ways it could take place. The first is that CFIUS could force ByteDance to sell off TikTok to a US-owned company by determining it a national security risk (thats what happened to Grindr after it was sold to a Chinese company). Another is that it could put TikTok on whats called the entity list so that US companies like Apple and Google would be forced to remove it from their app stores. Adi Robertson at The Verge has a thorough examination of all these possibilities, but lets get to the real issue at play.

The case for banning TikTok, for many cybersecurity professionals, is relatively simple: The risk is simply too great, no matter how wonderful the content on the app may be. Kiersten Todt, managing director of the Cyber Readiness Institute, says that despite what TikTok claims, If the Chinese government wanted that data, they would be able to get that data.

While that may not scare the apps large user base of teenagers who are pretty sure the Chinese government doesnt care about their scrolling habits, Todt says its possible China could be building dossiers on high-profile individuals, including information like passwords, bank accounts, internet addresses, or geolocation, all of which could then be cross-referenced with even more personal data on other apps.

Ive been in the national security space for a couple of decades, and there is decades worth of evidence and data around Chinese interest, intent, and capability to hack the US, whether thats through intellectual property or through data theft, Todt says. The Chinese government hacked the broadest database of personnel in the US government. Theyre the only ones who have done that.

Todts other concern relates to Chinas role in the global tech wars at large. Artificial intelligence is only as good as the data that goes into it, and so if China continues to collect all of this data from populations around the world, its artificial intelligence has a lot more data input into it. How might it aggregate that data for the purposes of innovation, research and development and science? she asks. That can sound xenophobic, but it is a national security statement, just as we are cautious about Russia and Iran and North Korea for different reasons.

There are other arguments for banning TikTok, ones that relate to moderation and censorship. I find the data privacy issue to be a bit of a red herring, says Jordan Schneider, host of the ChinaTalk podcast and newsletter. The Chinese government has many likely more impactful ways of getting blackmail or corporate secrets or just general information about individual US nationals.

Instead, Schneider argues that the problem is the Chinese Communist Partys potential ability to influence conversation about politics on the app. People today are very concerned about the amount of power [Facebooks] Mark Zuckerberg has to value one type of speech over another or impacting elections by tweaking the algorithms and end up changing peoples opinions on certain things. So imagine if someone with the equivalent of Mark Zuckerbergs level of power over the US has no choice but to do what the CCP wants it to do? My sense is that is the case with ByteDance. He uses recent examples of Chinese disinformation campaigns on Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube around topics like the Hong Kong protests and Taiwanese independence.

I think theyve probably learned the lesson of 2016, which is that Russia can interfere in elections and basically get away with it, he says. What might that look like? For the average TikTok user, it wont really look like anything. You can just push certain videos more than others, and theres no open API to double-check these things, Schneider says. At the end of the day, the Chinese government clearly has the leverage to push ByteDance to do this sort of thing, and would honestly be dumb not to, because the prize is enormous, which is the ability to influence who the next president of the United States is.

It would be easy to leave it there, but Samm Sacks, a senior cybersecurity policy fellow at Yale Law Schools Paul Tsai China Center and New America who has testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee, warns against conflating Chinese tech companies with the CCP. There is much more of a push and pull in that relationship there, particularly around the security services access to private data, she says.

Plus, she argues that the incentive to censor content and steal user data is worth less than owning one of the worlds most important global tech companies. TikTok was intended to thrive and fly on its own overseas, and so its not necessarily in the Chinese government or ByteDances interest to set up the company to be secretly beholden to Beijing. Theres a commercial incentive at play that I think we have to take into account.

TikTok has, for many people in American politics and tech, become an existential threat that no amount of distancing itself from China building headquarters in the US and London, hiring a former Disney executive as its CEO will undermine. TikToks terms of use and black box algorithm are virtually identical to Facebooks policies, but its success has foreshadowed a potential end to Silicon Valleys dominance. Unspoken in many tech executives dismissal of TikTok is protectionism and, arguably, xenophobia.

Should the US government ban TikTok, Sacks says, it would be an important step toward the US government controlling the way that Americans use the internet, which is ironically a step toward Beijings own cyber-sovereignty, the very thing weve been railing against for years.

It also would likely be against the USs commercial interests. It offers a blueprint for others around the world to think, Maybe we dont trust the way that Silicon Valley companies are handling our data, so lets just ban them, too, she says. Were already starting to see the rise of digital sovereignty in Europe and in India in these really important markets, and when we think about the so-called tech competition with China, particularly with artificial intelligence and machine learning, what is it thats going to give US companies an edge? Its access to large international data sets. If we are increasingly closed out of markets around the world and access to that data because weve helped create a blueprint for how to do it with China, I could see those same tools turned around on us.

Instead, Sacks has called for a comprehensive federal data privacy law that would be applied to all platforms, not just Chinese-owned ones, that would create standards for better data security, algorithmic transparency, and better management of online content. All of the things that I think were using is China as a foil and saying, That company is a threat, lets stamp them out, [could be dealt with by] developing our own vision for how we want to govern the internet in a more democratic, secure way, she says.

China aside, a TikTok ban would have serious effects on American youth culture, where hundreds of teenagers have now built massive followings and spread important political messaging on an app that allowed them to reach huge audiences. Its changed not only the experience of being online but the experience of being a young person.

TikTok has serious flaws conspiracy theories in particular, some related to QAnon, Pizzagate, and the coronavirus, have thrived unchecked on the app but theres still no evidence that the Chinese government has anything to do with any of those. Would setting a precedent against any one Chinese-owned tech company solve the immediate issues that affect American social media users, namely misinformation, content moderation, and transparency? Or would it allow Silicon Valley companies like Facebook to continue to mimic competitors software and grow ever larger and more powerful? Its now in the hands of the government to decide.

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Will Trump ban TikTok in the USA? - Vox.com